Student-Content: All Web All The Time

"The world is changing so fast that the concept of schools teaching people what they need to know is no longer viable, we're moving into a time when people need to know how to learn things they weren't taught in school. Second, we now have the technology to let kids learn better. This will not just allow them to learn the same things better; it will teach kids to learn radical new things at all ages." -- Dr. Seymour Papert

This quote from the article "No Lectures or Teachers, Just Software," by Joshua Green, was one of my favorite readings from this week's lesson. Discovering new ways to engage students with course content is always an instructors greatest challenge especially where technology is involved. As a “sage on the stage,” initially it was easier to grasp how to design student-instructor and student-student interactions, but more difficult to envision interactive student-content designs. Reading the work of student-content design experts helped to better focus my approach while giving me new ideas for content interactions.

I found the visionary expertise of Dr. Papert and Dr. Schank inspirational. As a new online designer/instructor I struggle with making sure my design and course content are accessible to all learning styles, while remaining interesting and interactive. These educational design experts offered me new ideas and concepts. Dr. Schank suggests that instead of using full-blown lectures, online instructors could use video snippets to address the question at hand . Slowly this segmented approach would present the full topic only in smaller sections. He feels students learn better if information is given in this “piecemeal” approach. Dr. Schank refers to this as “just in time” learning. This is ideal for a course like mine that trains media students to design non-traditional broadcast products. I can use short video clips to demonstrate a specific production style and have students analyze this approach.

The "Using Case Studies in Learning" and “Webquests” information gave me even more design direction and content resources. The case studies site offered excellent links and interaction design ideas. One of the links I found most beneficial for my design work is the New York Times educational web site. It supplied web articles addressing broadcasting issues that I could incorporate through hyperlinking into my LMS design for student review. This is an excellent way to give students exposure to examples of "Real World” experiences for analysis.

It was also enlightening to discover a site like “Webquest.” I never realized there was such a helpful online resource giving direction to educators wanting to utilize the Web as if it were an interactive book. Since I’m not using a course text, this site will be an important resource for linking students to current course information. I was relieved to see so many online student-content resources and ideas, this guidance is invaluable.